They could hire a dozen of new artists to help with the remodeling but they keep it as a side project.

Isn't this already the case, though? Aren't there already a few dozen artists working on this as a side project?

Besides, I'm pretty sure Blizzard have stated that they don't want to just hire artists, simply because that means a lot more effort will be spent making sure they stick to the in-house style and that they are able to maintain a certain standard of quality.
Updating, what, eight year-old(?) models is a problem that requires care and plenty of thought. The solution is not to throw artists at it.

Originally Posted by The Illusive Man

... character remodeling is a very important point on their agenda.

I would argue that just hiring artists for the sake of this project wouldn't make it appear very important to Blizzard: Can they guarantee that these artists are familiar with the in-house style? Can they guarantee that these artists have any experience? Can they guarantee that these artists can work at a high standard? Can they guarantee these artists care for the project rather than simply the paycheck?

Any artist that wants to work at Blizzard and that Blizzard wants to hire, has probably already been hired.

As impatient as I am (and, indeed, pretty much everyone else), I would much prefer the art team take as much time as necessary - hiring random artists whom may be unfamiliar with the style and may not even care about the project beyond the paycheck is not the answer and, frankly, I wouldn't want them working on it.

Well, I reckon they'll still be ready for the next expansion. They've said countless times in recent interviews that they can speed it up now that 5.4 coming close to release, and that they're increasing the teams by 40% and even more later on. I mean it seems perfect to release them on WoW's 10th anniversary. I also believe the subs will go up quite a bit because of this and whatever the next expansion is (Old God or Legion) will definitely bring in some old players. I'm still very much expecting to see some of the new models at Blizzcon 2013.

It's all bullshit and you have to be blind not to realize that. New Characters models is obviously going to be a selling point of the next expansion. Obviously not as a key feature since they couldn't make new models x-pac only but they'll release them about the same time as next x-apc to increase the hype of whatever the next expansion is.

It's all commercial. 25% done? My ass. It's all corporate bullshit, they're just waiting for the right time to use them as a selling point.

Edit: I agree that the 1st place you'll probably see some of the new models is next Blizzcon and for obvious reasons.

if there will be some new faces for char then blizz should inplement some new feature in-game that allows to change face and skin color like hair cut in barber. Plastic surgeon on the back of auction house maybe?

if there will be some new faces for char then blizz should inplement some new feature in-game that allows to change face and skin color like hair cut in barber. Plastic surgeon on the back of auction house maybe?

However, there is this paid feature to change your character's appearance.
Blizzard would allow players to change the look of their char for ingame gold instead of real live money: not going to happen.

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Originally Posted by Baar

Me personally, I think it's more players have selective hearing. They hear what they want and be damned if anyone tells them something different.

Part of good communication is to know your audience.
They should know by now how the players react to what they say/show.

Good PR people take into account how the community tends to take things out of proportion.
Giving vague answers is not the way to go.

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Originally Posted by Eviscero

Addressed by my other point that they may have been working on them for a long time, but not constructing anything as they had to plan, debate, test, and do a bunch of pre-build nonsense to make sure they pull it off properly. If they are now 25% done with CONSTRUCTION (which we honestly don't know if that s what they meant by that but I will assume so for the sake of my argument) then I am sure it will take far less time than it has to finish them up.

There is no way that you can extrapolate 6 years from now till completion by assuming 25% took 2 years, they wouldn't even be entertaining any comments about new models if they weren't, at most, a year out.

Me personally, I think it's more players have selective hearing. They hear what they want and be damned if anyone tells them something different.

There is nothing selective about the fact that they said that they started working on them, back a few weeks after 4.3 launched.

Originally Posted by Mall Security

You don't know that she didn't, and it doesn't matter what she said, her parents are "RESPONSIBLE" for her, and as "RESPONSIBLE" parents they protected their child, fuck the little boy or your feelings.

I'm just laughing at all the people who are like "I think the 25% figure is BS. They're lying so they can surprise us at Blizzcon."

Then when Blizzcon comes and goes with no completed models, maybe a preview of one or two that they have good progress on, these same people will be back to flood the forums saying "BLIZZ! Where are the new models!?"

And Blizzard, perplexed, will say "Well, we told you we were only about 25% done. What did you think that meant?"

I mean, are you kidding? They have the new expansion to tease and hype us with at Blizzcon. By the time they've announced that, I think a good portion of players will be all "New player models? Huh, oh yeah, I guess we did want those. BUT DID YOU SEE THE EXPANSION TRAILER??"

Now, don't get me wrong. I'm frustrated and disappointed that it's been at least a year, if not two, and they've only gotten a quarter of the work done. I expected at least twice that, if not more. I too expected a Blizzcon reveal, and a 6.0 release. Blizzard, to my knowledge, has never flat-out lied about stuff like this before. Oh sure, when we discovered the worgen and goblin masks, they planted more to try to lead us off the trail and said "Well they don't have to be new playable races... they could be anything!" But they didn't say "They're not the new player races," because that would be a lie. Same thing when we discovered Mists of Pandaria... they said "It doesn't have to be the new expansion," and they were right, it didn't have to be... but it was.

Now, if they are saying they are 25% done, I believe that to be an accurate figure. They must have known how much rage and gnashing of teeth there would be for them to throw us such a low number, but they did it anyway. Why? They didn't have to say anything exact. They could have said something like "We've made good progress, and will reveal them when they are ready," but they didn't. I think they wanted us to know that they will not be ready for a 6.0 launch, at least not a full set of 10 races, and will certainly not be ready for a Blizzcon reveal.

In fact, I highly doubt it will be much more than a footnote in the expansion trailer (much like the Dance studio was a footnote in the Wrath trailer) if even that-- since they likely won't be ready in time for 6.0, they don't want another repeat of not fulfilling the promises on the box.

If I'm wrong, I'm wrong (and I would dearly hope to be wrong, my poor femcow would really like more than four faces to choose from sometime before 2015); but I suspect that is the truth behind it.

While I highly doubt they will release all character models at 6.0. and I'm not sure if they'll even be mentioned in the expansion trailer, the following would be soooo cool:

*Metzen's voice appears*

We have ventured into the demonic realm of Outland...
We have sailed to the frozen shores of Northrend..
We stood united in a shattered world against Deahtwing...
We discovered the beautiful but shrouded lands of the pandaren...

Yet, there is still one thread left to deal with...
A mysterious master lurking in the depths...
An army led by no other than a once beloved queen...

So it's been at LEAST a year if we take the first use of the word "high priority," if not almost two if we take the first use of "actively worked on," that they have been creating new player models as more than a "Oh, hey, if you have time, you might as well" thing.

And to be at 25%? I cannot fathom how it can be taking that long. That's two races in a year plus. That's one race per six months in the best case. That's sixty months or five freaking years before we'll see all ten races, unless they really get their shit together. Even half that time, even two and a half years, a year and a half from now, is much too long.

I suspect we will see a LOT of quitting if we don't have a huge update on this at Blizzcon.